home

toc

Overview
The goal of the Digital Educator Program (DEP) is to provide teachers appropriate technology tools, applications and training in order to engage their peers and students in learning activities aligned with curriculum benchmarks and standards. The success of this program is dependent on the ability to effectively train Digital Educator mentors to work with mentees and thus building capacity for integrating technology into classroom instruction.

Our mentors, certified K-12 educators, receive a toolkit with hardware and software such as: Laptop, projector, digital camera, digital video camera, one year membership for Apple educator support site which includes NetTrekker, iSight, and much more. In addition to the toolkit, the educators also attend four days of technology integration training. The final day is devoted to training on how to effectively mentor adult learners. This program is a three-year commitment for the mentors.

The DEP of mentors and mentees will be evaluated on the following criteria. Pre/post data collected from participants has shown significant growth in the following:


 * Aligning instructional practice to standards
 * Understanding of how appropriate use of technology tools can enhance curriculum instruction and student learning.
 * Understanding of essential questions and enduring understandings
 * Using Internet resources for lesson and unit planning
 * Understanding and integrating different assessment techniques
 * Using a variety of assessment tools to collaborate with colleagues to strengthen and improve teaching and learning
 * Creating instructional materials
 * Using technology to differentiate instruction
 * Using technology resources to facilitate higher order and complex thinking skills
 * Designing and teaching technology-rich lessons in which students take responsibility for their learning
 * Adapting to a variety of teaching environments such as one computer in the classroom, mobile laptop computers, and computer labs